Rock and Roll Angel Pt. 02

Ethan looked irritated but he nodded.

"We'll do it up stairs," Ashley said. "You too Joy." Ashley looked at Jenna, Lisa and Kat. "Make yourselves' comfortable. We'll be down again in a few minuets."

Ethan gave the girls a goofy little wave and headed to the sliding doors. Ashley put an arm around Sarah's waist and they followed him in with Joy in tow.

Chapter Six Stray Kat

"Unreal," Jenna whispered.

"The guy's a total medical freak," Lisa said. "Amazing they've kept this out of the news blogs."

"Probably because no one would believe it," Jenna figured.

"Roadies for a fucking angel," Lisa said with a shake of her head. "Didn't see that coming."

"It's a miracle," Kat said.

"Won't disagree on that," Lisa said.

Kat went to the food table to poke around for something to eat.

"Wow, girl," Lisa said. "Where do you PUT it?"

"Don't know," Kat said as she decided between the chocolate cheese cake or a fruit filled danish. She opted for half of each.

Lisa and Jenna each got a fresh beer and sat at the umbrella table near the pool. Kat joined them. As she worked on her dessert, Kat asked, "Ashley and Sarah are engaged?"

"Bother you?" Lisa asked.

"Don't know," Kat said.

Lisa frowned at her odd answer. "What do you mean, you don't know?"

"I've never considered women loving women before," Kat said as she licked sticky danish fruit from her fingers.

"The signs at the battle of the bands seem pretty plain to me," Lisa said.

Lisa was looking for a fight with the girl. Jenna considered telling Lisa to back off but she too was angry at Jesus Weeps's obnoxious views. She needed to know what Kat's own views were if she was to work with the chick all summer long.

Kat poked at her cheese cake with her fork, either she was gathering her thoughts or was stalling. Finally she said, "Homosexuals are considered unnatural were I come from."

"Thought so," Lisa said with contempt.

"I personally think that they shouldn't get married," Kat said softly.

"There we have it!" Lisa said. "The christian right has spoken."

"I don't think that men and women should get married either," Kat added.

"What?" Lisa asked.

"I think that marriage makes people unhappy," Kat said totally dead pan.

Lisa and Jenna stared dumfounded at the big eyed girl as she stuffed a huge wad of danish into her mouth.

Kat swallowed and continued. "My grand parents were unhappy people, my parents were unhappy people, all my married brothers and sisters, my married friends, unhappy. I can't see homosexuals being any different?"

Jenna nearly laughed out loud at the the look of stunned surprise on Lisa's face. "The point is," Lisa said, clearly grasping for some angle of attack, "in most of the country, gay and lesbians CAN'T marry under the law.

Kat's eyes widened. "They Can't?" she said clearly surprised. "Allen makes it sound that they can? That the laws say a church has to perform the wedding."

"I'm pretty sure that religious groups have the right to refuse," Jenna said. "State and county governments are the ones who have to grant licenses under new laws."

"If that is so," Kat said with a furrowed forehead, "why is Jesus Weeps spending all that money on banners and fliers?" the girl sounded truly dumbfounded. "We should spend that money on feeding poor colored children and leave the homosexuals alone."

"Amen sister," Jenna said with a laugh. Kat was clearly ignorant but in such an honest charming way. "Better drop that colored stuff though. Use black."

"What do you know about gay's and lesbians," Lisa scoffed as she got up to get another beer from the cooler. She held a Corona out to Kat.

"I don't kin to drinking," Kat said flatly.

"Beer's great with chocolate cheese cake," Lisa said.

Intrigued, Kat got up and cut a thick slice of chocolate cheese cake. Lisa popped the Corona and shoved a wedge of lime in the opening. Kat took a big bite of cheese cake then picked up the Corona and looked at the lime wedge a bit baffled.

"Do I suck on the lime first?"

"No, squeeze it over the top then add a sprinkle of slat," Jenna said. Kat looked baffled so Jenna took the Corona, squeezed the lime wedge over the rim, sprinkled some table salt over the top then handed it to Kat.

Kat took a tentative sip, licked her lips and pondered for a second. She took another fork full of chocolate cheese cake and followed it with a big swig of beer. "That is nice," Kat said. "To answer your question," Kat went on. "I don't know a thing about lesbians but I do know a lot about gay boys."

"How so?" Lisa asked barely holding back her contempt.

Apprehension gripped Jenna's heart. Lisa was gonna tear this poor big eyed hick to pieces.

"My first boyfriend was gay," Kat said, tucking into the cake and beer.

"THIS I gotta hear!" Lisa said.

"His name was Claymore Shaw, his daddy was the handy man at our church on the hill. Me and Claymore was friends going back to toddler times. He and me went to preschool bible class all the way up to middle school years. In middle school rumors were flying that he had kissed a boy at bible summer camp. I asked him about it and he said that he had. He said it was the pastor's son at the bible camp. I asked right then and there if he was a homosexual. He said yes."

Kat went quiet and took a big swig of beer and chased it down with some cake.

"What did you do?" Jenna finally ask.

"I got stupid and avoided him for months. I was scared you know? All the other kids were mean to him. The boys beat him up a lot."

"So his only friend left him out in the cold," Lisa said heartlessly.

"Lisa ..." Jenna said, reprimanding her friend for being so callous even though she was thinking the exact same thing.

Kat picked up the salt shaker and applied a fresh coating to her beer. Tears welled up in her eyes. "I was young and stupid. I missed him and came back to him in time. I couldn't bare to watch him get hurt no more so I came up with a plan that he and me should start dating."

"Thought you could cure him of his affliction?" Lisa asked with a sneer.

"To be honest, yeah. But Claymore let me know that wasn't gonna happen. He was what he was. He told me all about his summer with the pastor's son. It sounded dreamy and romantic like in the movies. Anyway, our pretending worked. Everyone thought we was a couple. The mean boys stopped hurtin' him. They even made friends with him. A lot of boys were after me. I can sing and that made me popular. I ain't bad lookin' either. Some considered me quite the catch."

"So just like that," Lisa said, "the whole town thought he had gone straight?"

"Heck no," Kat said. "We worked it in the beginning. Claymore had a flare for drama and we staged a lot of stuff. He made sure that that his daddy and mom caught us making out on the porch swing one night. They drove me home straight and proper like good Christians would but didn't tell my parents because they were so keen that Claymore was with a girl. We would kiss at school were everyone could see us. He was one hell of a kisser too. Every straight boy that I've kissed since have been sooooo disappointing."

Jenna and Lisa both let out a belly laughs.

"The crowning touch was so simple. Claymore had me buy one of those home pregnancy test kit things. We made sure that the most gossipy woman in town, Nancy Capri, saw me standing in line to pay for it."

Lisa laughed. "Your Claymore sound's like quite the evil genius."

"He was never boring for sure," Kat said. Her smile disappeared and she looked very sad.

Lisa and Jenna exchanged a look. The girl's sudden sadness clearly announced a coming tragedy.

"A day came that Claymore couldn't live the lie anymore. He hated our little town. He had kept in touch with that pastor's son by e-mail. They planed on running away to Memphis together. He boarded a bus and I never saw him again. They say he died in a car crash just outside the town were the pastor boy lived. I think the pastor got wind of Claymore's coming."

After a long pause, Jenna asked, "You think he was murdered?"

"Don''t know," Kat said softly, then took a bite of chocolate cheese cake and chased it with Corona.

Ashley, Sarah and Joy returned to the pool deck. Each woman got a fresh beer from the cooler. Kat went to get a second beer for herself. Joy sat with the others under the umbrella and Ashley and Sarah shared a deckchair. Lisa kept stealing looks at Ashley and Sarah. She seemed to have eyes for Ashley in particular.

Better watch your gaze girl, Jenna thought. Sarah is one chick you didn't want pissed at you. Too late, Sarah caught Lisa checking out her wife to be.

"How can a person grow wings?" Jenna asked hoping to divert a possible disaster. Getting fired an hour after getting a job would be SOOO humiliating.

"A person can't," Ashley said. She sounded a little pissed.

Sarah laughed as she stroked Ashley's long black hair. "Our geneticist is never going to accept the obvious."

"It's a miracle," Kat said. She let out a burp then followed with a giggle. Jenna noticed that her beer was more than half done. The girl was tipsy, clearly a light weight when it came to drinking thus proving that eating a lot of food was no cure for drunkenness.

"No one is gonna argue you on that point," Joy said.

"You really a geneticist?" Lisa asked Ashley.

"Working on my doctorate at Honolulu University," Ashley said."Took this summer off to whore around and play in a rock-n-roll band. Sarah's a lawyer. She works for the good guys, Green piece, animal rights, sometimes the EPA."

"You became a lawyer?" Jenna asked surprised.

"Who knew that a tattooed goth, lesbian chick in a rock band called Bitter Byle could be so organized," Sarah said.

"What about you?" Lisa asked Joy.

"Out of work liberal arts major with a minor in dance," Joy said.

"She owns the most popular yoga studio back in Honolulu called the Joy Of Yoga," Ashley said. "She just signed a deal with Sunset Gym to teach all of their yoga classes starting next winter. The little chick is rolling in dough."

"Go ahead, ruin the mystic," Joy said.

"You and Ethan share the same last name," Kat said to Ashley. "Brother, Sister?"

Lisa handed Kat a third another Corona. She didn't refuse it. Jenna gave Lisa a disapproving look. Lisa ignored her.

"Cousins several times removed," Ashley said.

Ashley shifted and stretched on the deckchairs with Sarah. In her snug white slacks and pink spandex top, her slim gorgeous figure was put on displayed. Jenna cringed at the way Lisa was blatantly staring at Ashley.

"You checking out my fiance," Sarah asked Lisa.

Lisa's eyes grew big at the accusation.

"Sarah, really," Ashley said. "I'm in a rock band, guys check me out all the time."

"Guys can check you out all the they want. But other chicks? Noway," Sarah said.

Jenna saw that Sarah spoke with a tiny smile, Ashley was smiling too. They were clearly messing with Lisa but the poor girl was so freaked at being called out she didn't get that they were joking with her.

"Heard you like girls?" Sarah asked Lisa.

"Um ... I didn't mean to ... you know with Ashley ..." Lisa stammered.

"So you don't find her attractive?"

"She's gorgeous! Totally Hot!"

"So you DO wanna fuck her."

"Um ... shit!"

Kat let out a drunken giggle and said, "Y'all are messing with her."

Lisa's jaw dropped, clearly embarrassed that ignorant Kat got the joke before she did.

Sarah sat up and said to Lisa, "Wanna see Dorthy's record collection of hot rock-n-roll babes from the eighties?"

"Thought we were gonna talk about Ethan?" Joy asked.

We have all summer to do that," Sarah said. "What you say Lisa?"

"Sure," Lisa said but clearly sounding not so sure. Lisa followed Sarah into the house.

A few seconds later, Ashley got up and said, "I'm gonna make sure Sarah behaves herself," and trotted off after the others.

"Your friend really into girls?" Joy asked Jenna.

"She claims to be," Jenna said with a shrug. "She started talking about it a lot starting this January. Who knows. You into girls?"

"Dabbled, but dick is my preference."

"Does Ethan like girls?" Kat asked.

"Oh yeah," Joy said. "And girls really, REALLY like him."

"You been with him," Kat said as more of a statement of truth then a question.

"No comment," Joy said. To Jenna, that was a resounding yes.

"He gives me this wild vibe that is kinda sexy and creepy at the same time," Jenna said.

Joy laughed. "I'd never use the word creepy but I know what you mean. What you get from him, Kat?"

Kat blushed and took a sip of her beer. She thought for a second then said, "It like when you notice a boy for the first time ... you know, that he's handsome and all that."

"You mean the first time you see someone in a sexual light?" Joy asked.

"Yeah, like that I guess. Only a hundred times stronger."

Joy pushed away from the table, got up and stretched out on one of the deckchairs. There were three in a row so Jenna joined her on one side Kat the other. They all lay back looking at the starry sky above them.

"This may sound a little crazy," Kat said, "but I smelled fresh strawberries and cut grass when my face brush his wing "It was ... weird."

"According to Ashley, his wings put out some kind of pheromone that stimulates the part of your brain that controls you sexual drive."

"Back st the theater I smelled different things too," Jenna said.

"Does it really excite him when you touch his wings?" Kat asked.

"Yep," Joy said.

"Wow," Kat said. "Can I have another beer?"

"All you want," Joy said.

Kat got up to get a beer then was seriously sidetracked by the food table. She gave serious attention to the sushi tray. "I've only seen these things in magazines," she said.

"Is she for real?" Joy whispered to Jenna.

"I just met her today," Jenna whispered back.

"What's this green stuff? Guacamole?," Kat asked as she dipped her finger in a bowl and took a lick.

"Careful," Joy warned.

Kat made a face and blinked her eyes. "Horseradish," she said several seconds later.

"Wasabi," Joy said with a smile. "It'll set your sinuses straight. Put some in one of those little bowls and cut it with a lot of soy sauce. Then dip the sushi in."

"It's great with beer," Lisa said.

"Bring the whole tray over," Joy said.

The three women sat eating Sushi with wasabi dip and beer.

"What hotel you saying at in town?" Jenna asked Kat.

After a shot pause, Kat said. "The Porter." The chick was a bad liar.

"You can't go back can you?" Joy said.

Kat blushed and nodded.

"Got the cash for another hotel?" Joy asked.

Kat blushed deeper and shook her head no.

"Kieth and Dorthy will put you up," Joy said.

"A good Christian doesn't impose," Kat said softly.

"And a good Christian like me don't put people out in the street," Joy said.

Kat looked surprised. "You a Christian?"

"My mom and dad are non practicing born agains," Joy said. "I haven't been in a church since I was seven."

"I thought you'd be Buddhist or Hindu or somethin' like that," Kat said.

Jenna cringed but Joy laughed. "Buddhist maybe, Shinto more likely, Hindu? Not my part of the world."

"The tour don't start 'till June," Kat said. "That's three weeks away. I can't impose on Kieth and Dorthy for that long."

"They'll rehearse you to death and not pay you for it, I promise," Joy said. "Is your stuff in your car?"

Jenna saw the relief in the girls big eyes. "Along side the house. I don't drive and couldn't afford a taxi so I walked."

"It's over five miles to the Porter Inn," Jenna said.

Kat shrugged and took a big swig of beer. "This beer and food is real nice," the girl said. She giggled. It was clear that she was getting seriously drunk. Kat looked at Joy and asked, "What's it like making love to Ethan?"

"Kat!" Jenna said, appalled at the girl's directness. She hardly knew Kat but she was so accustom to shouting Lisa down she responded on instinct.

"No worries," Joy said. "If it were me, I'd be dying to know too." Joy leaned forward, the other women leaned in too. "It's like being with a real angel," Joy said softly and sincerely.

After a couple of seconds of quiet, Kat said, "Maybe he is."

"Won't argue that with you," Joy said. "Wish I could talk him out of cutting off his wings."

"Yeah, right," Jenna said, sure that Joy was joking.

"How awful," Kat said, clearly thinking the opposite.

"I probably shouldn't be telling you any of this," Joy said with a serious and down cast expression," but I'm desperate. I think he's really gonna do it. I need somebody on my side to talk him out of it."

"The others are for it?" Jenna asked a little shocked.

"Course not," Joy said. Ethan made me swear not to tell them. He said he'd tell them in time. I'm telling you guys before he make me promise not to. " She sat in silence looking both sad and angry. She looked at the Kat and Jenna. "Sorry, I'm such a stupid head for laying all this on you. Ethan will be pissed if he found out I told."

"Um ... no trouble," Jenna said awkwardly.

Kat slipped in next to Joy on her deck chair and gave the girl a hug. "Jesus loves you," Kat said.

Joy let out a laugh. "Thanks," she said. Then unexpectedly, Joy started crying.

A half minute later, Joy pulled away. "Talk about not living up to my name."

Kat had finished her beer and offered to fetch everyone a fresh one.

As she took her beer, Joy asked, "Any of the members of Jesus Weeps chase you?"

"All tried but none were boyfriend material," Kat said then took a long draw of beer. She gave a cute little belch then said, "I did sleep with three of them though."

"You slept with three out of the four band members?" Joy ask with disbelief.

"Man, do I have you Christian types ALL wrong," Jenna said.

Kat shrugged. "I know good girls don't sleep around. But it was so boring on the road all the time. The guys were nice and treated me right."

"Why only three?" Joy asked. "Didn't get around to the forth yet?"

"Not gonna happen with him," Kat said. "Don't like him."

"Let me guess," Jenna said. "It's the leader of the band, right?"

"Alan, he's a jerk some times. He's mad because I ignore his advances. He knows that I slept with the others. Also, he was one of the guys mean to Claymore."

"Who?" Joy asked.

"Her old gay boyfriend," Jenna said.

"Girl," Joy said. "I have TOTLLY misjudged you."

The suddenness of the situation was nagging in back of Jenna's mind. She decided to voice her unease. "Why pick us?" Jenna asked. "You know, me Lisa and Kat here. Seems kind of random almost. I'm not saying I don't want the money but this all feels a little ... weird."

Kat looked at Joy expectantly, apparently she had the same feelings that Jenna had.

Joy seemed to mull something over then she said, "Ethan picked you and Kat. We needed somebody like Lisa so we pulled her in too. But you two are solely Ethan's choice. He decided on Kat after he heard her sing at the battle of the bands. He decided on you after coming close to you back stage."

Jenna didn't much like the sound of that. "Why did Ethan chose us?"

"You're like me," Joy said softly. "I suspect that the three of us are putting something out that he likes." After a short silence Joy looked Jenna in the eyes and said, "All our lives people have been drawn to us. In a way, we're a lot like him."

"This conversation is making me a little uneasy," Jenna said.

"Sorry," Joy said. "I'm not explaining this so good but believe me when I say that we're good people. Rough around the edges maybe. In Sarah's case, SHARP around the edges. Sometimes we're obnoxious and we can get a little raunchy. Sarah and Ashley can get a little competitive, Dorothy a little bossy. Kieth is a sweet marshmallow and we all drink a little too much. And Ethan is ... well ... Ethan.